Hardware-Accelerated Visualization of Surface Light Fields

1. A method comprising rendering a portion of an object by using multitexturing hardware to combine a plurality of maps generated by singular value decomposition of a light field reflectance representation associated with the object.

2. The method of claim 1 : wherein the plurality of maps comprise a plurality of matrices; and wherein combining the plurality of maps includes using the multitexturing hardware to multiply the plurality of matrices.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein combining the plurality of maps comprises: forming a first product of a first light field surface texture map tat corresponds to a surface portion of an object and a first light field view texture map that corresponds to a viewing direction used to view the surface portion of the object; forming a second product of a second light field surface texture map also corresponding to the surface portion and a second light field view texture map also corresponding to the viewing direction; and forming a sum of the first product and the second product.

4. The method of claim 3 , further comprising generating the first light field view texture map by converting viewing direction into texture coordinates.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the portion of the object comprises a triangle.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving a map via the Internet.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising displaying the portion of the object.

8. A method comprising: forming a first product of a first light field surface texture map that corresponds to a surface portion of an object and a first light field view texture map that corresponds to a viewing direction used to view the surface portion of the object; forming a second product of a second light field surface texture map also corresponding to the surface portion and a second light field view texture map also corresponding to the viewing direction; wherein the light field surface texture maps and the light field view texture maps are based on singular value decomposition of a light field reflectance representation for the objects forming a sum of the first product and the second product; and displaying the portion of the object based on the sum.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein forming the products comprises using multitexturing hardware to form the products.

10. The method of claim 8 , wherein the portion of the object comprises a triangle.

11. The method of claim 8 , further comprising receiving a map via the Internet.

12. A method comprising generating an approximate appearance for a portion of an object by using multitexturing hardware to combine a position dependent portion of a surface light field approximation that depends on a position of the portion on the object with a view dependent portion of the surface light field approximation that depends on a viewing direction used to view the portion of the object, wherein the position dependent portion and the view dependent portion are based on singular value decomposition of a light field reflectance representation for the object.

13. The method of claim 12 ; wherein the position dependent portion and the view dependent portion comprise matrices; and wherein using the multitexturing hardware to combine the portions comprises using the multitexturing hardware to multiply the matrices.

14. The method of claim 12 , wherein the portion of the object comprises a triangle.

15. The method of claim 12 , further comprising receiving a map via the Internet.

16. A machine-readable medium having stored thereon data representing sequences of instructions that if executed cause multitexturing hardware to perform operations comprising sing rendering a portion of an object by combining a plurality of maps generated by singular value decomposition of a light field reflectance representation associated with the object.

17. The machine-readable medium of claim 16 : wherein the plurality of maps comprise a plurality of matrices, and wherein the instructions for combining the plurality of maps further comprise instructions that if executed causes the multitexturing hardware to perform operations comprising multiplying the plurality of matrices.

18. The machine-readable medium of claim 16 , wherein the instructions for combining the plurality of maps further comprising instructions that if executed causes the multitexturing hardware to perform operations comprising: forming a first product of a first light field surface texture map that corresponds to a surface portion of an object and a first light field view texture map that corresponds to a viewing direction used to view the surface portion of the object; forming a second product of a second light field surface texture map also corresponding to the surface portion and a second light field view texture map also corresponding to the viewing direction; and forming a sum of the first product and the second product.

19. A computer system comprising: a bus to communicate information; a processor coupled with the bus to process information; a multitexturing hardware coupled with the bus; a memory coupled with the bus, the memory storing data representing sequences of instructions that if executed cause the multitexturing hardware to render a portion of an object by combining a plurality of maps generated by singular value decomposition of a light field reflectance representation associated with the object; and a communication device coupled with the bus to link to a network.

20. The computer system of claim 19 : wherein the plurality of maps comprise a plurality of matrices, and wherein the instructions to combine the plurality of maps further comprise instructions that if executed causes the multitexturing hardware to perform operations comprising multiplying the plurality of matrices.

21. The computer system of claim 19 , wherein the instructions to combine the plurality of maps further comprise instructions that if executed causes the multitexturing hardware to perform operations comprising: forming a first product of a first light field surface texture map that corresponds to a surface portion of an object and a first light field view texture map that corresponds to a viewing direction used to view the surface portion of the object; forming a second product of a second light field surface texture map also corresponding to the surface portion and a second light field view texture map also corresponding to the viewing direction; and forming a sum of the first product and the second product.